In other words, the broadband cap may have less to do with managing congestion on Comcast's data network than with making over-the-top video services like Netflix and Hulu unattractive for heavy television users who are the most lucrative customers for Comcast's paid video services.

Change the highlighted "may have" to "obviously has" and we have the whole reason for usage caps.

Honestly, since Comcast has instituted the usage meter on their website there hasn't been a month that I didn't exceed the 250gb limit, yet I have yet to have been shut off or even warned. But given the psychological effect usage caps and metered billing have on people (as alluded to in this very well-written editorial) there's no doubt in my mind that many people have scaled back their usage or resisted cutting the cord out of fear. Applied as either a strong-arm tactic or a scare tactic, given the reality of current consumer bandwidth usage trends and general bandwidth availability, usage caps are despicably unethical in my opinion.

I've never had Comcast before, but from what I have heard, and this sounds really conspiracy theory-ish, is that Comcast only enforces the caps on people who have internet only, and not those with television and internet. Essentially, Comcast figures that if you have internet and no television service you're probably pirating your television, so those users are the only ones they enforce it on.